


and we will run, we will crawl

by Duck_Life



Category: X-Force (Comics), X-Men (Comicverse)
Genre: Gen, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Mojoworld, Not Really Character Death, Returning Home, Teleportation, Wakes & Funerals, references to julio's past suicide attempt(s)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-04
Updated: 2019-08-23
Packaged: 2019-10-04 00:28:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 18,088
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17294201
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Duck_Life/pseuds/Duck_Life
Summary: Rictor's weird but wonderful life with Shatterstar is disrupted when he gets some news that threatens to destroy him.





	1. Sam Guthrie Makes a House Call

_“I’ve never been afraid of dying,” Shatterstar admits suddenly, rushed and panting, knowing his time is fading. “But I was afraid of dying before I figured it all out— how to be a person, how to care for people. I was afraid I’d die before I learned how to love you the way you deserve.”_

_“’Star,” Rictor says desperately, looking over Shatterstar’s shoulder at the pulsing light behind him. “Don’t do this. It won’t be like before, with Mephisto. You’ll be dead.”_

_“That’s okay,” Star says, looking at him earnestly. “That’s okay. I’m not afraid anymore. It’s… I can make this sacrifice now, because I know exactly what I’m giving up. And it was beautiful. It really was, Julio.”_

_“Please,” Ric says, tears pricking at his eyes. His arms rope around Star’s waist like he can stop him, hold him here in this moment forever and ever. Shatterstar laughs. “What’s so funny?”_

_“You were the first person to hold me,” he points out. “When I was born. You were the first.” He kisses him hard and fast like an electric shock. “You will be the last.”_

_And he runs and jumps into oblivion._

* * *

“Yeagh!” Rictor yells, jerking upright in bed. It takes him a second to remember where he is, what’s a dream and what’s reality. Flannel sheets tangled around his legs, TV mounted on the opposite wall, pictures of friends and teammates crowding the bulletin board hanging next to the door. Manor Crossing. His and ’Star’s bedroom. Right.

He stretches and rolls off the bed, trying to shake off the disturbing nightmare. It’d be easier, of course, if Shatterstar had been here when he woke up, but he already left for whatever today’s X-Force crisis is. There’s a note taped to the bathroom mirror in Shatterstar’s careful block lettering — _I will be home in time for Wheel of Fortune. I love you. - Shatterstar_. It makes Julio smile while he’s brushing his teeth, but he still wishes ’Star would’ve woken him up.

He likes kissing him goodbye before he goes on a mission.

With X-Force keeping Shatterstar busy, Rictor’s taken up some of his landlord duties. Today’s to-do list includes fixing The End’s air conditioning unit.

“Morning, Rictor,” she says when she opens the door, ready with a cup of coffee for him. The End drinks more coffee than anyone he’s ever known, barring Cable. He suspects it’s a traveled-here-from-the-future thing, and he’s been cross-referencing that theory by keeping note of the number of times he runs into Lucas Bishop at Starbucks.

Coffee is too bitter for Shatterstar, which makes him an exception to Julio’s theory. That tracks, though. Shatterstar’s usually an exception.

“Mornin’,” Ric says back, accepting the coffee. “How’s it going? Besides the busted AC, I mean.”

“It goes well,” The End says, sipping her coffee. “Gabbi was a finalist in her school spelling bee this week. She was eliminated on the word ‘Machiavellian.’ I am still very proud of her, though, even though she didn’t win.”

“That’s good,” Rictor nods, blowing on his coffee, which is still too hot for him. “Jeez, I couldn’t spell for shit when I was her age. Got even harder when I started learning to read and write English.”

“You did not sleep well last night,” The End says suddenly.

Rictor stares at her. “Uh, yeah, actually, how’d you—?”

“The walls shook,” she says. “I thought at first that the X-Angels had finally come to terminate me. I was relieved when I realized it was probably just you having a fitful dream.”

Rictor looks down to hide the embarrassment evident in his expression. “Yeah, well. I’m sorry about that.”

“Don’t be sorry,” she says. “You are entitled to your bad dreams as well as your good ones.”

* * *

After he’s done fixing The End’s air conditioner, Rictor heads back to the apartment he shares with Shatterstar to make himself a sandwich and watch another episode of “The Haunting of Hill House.” He’s barely five minutes into the episode, though, when someone knocks at the door.

“Sam?” Ric asks when he opens the door to see Cannonball himself, Sam Guthrie, standing on top of the welcome mat that Shatterstar bought. Rictor’s about to make some crack about how married life’s treating him or how being a dad has aged him, but when he gets a good look at Sam’s eyes, it’s like his voice fails him.

“Julio, Ah’m really sorry,” Sam says, his face solemn, his hands folded in front of him, holding his goggles. Ric’s heart starts pounding and he doesn’t know what’s coming but he knows it’s bad, and has Sam ever actually called him by his first name before? He can’t remember. “Mission went south, and… and we lost Shatterstar.”

The gears in Rictor’s head grate and grind for a moment. “Lost him,” he repeats. “Lost him, what do you mean you lost him?” He laughs, sounding crazed. “He’s a big guy, Sammy—”

“Ric,” Sam says, being a leader. Being a friend. “Shatterstar is dead.”

“Um,” Rictor says, and he is opening and closing his mouth like a fish left lying on the sand when the tide disappears, and everything in his brain is screaming static. “I have to… I have to…”

“Ric,” Sam says, hands out like he's going to catch him when he falls, not realizing that Rictor has already hit the ground, that there is no air in his lungs and every inch of him aches harshly, stings. “Ah can't even imagine how this must—”

“I have to,” Rictor says again, his hand against the door. “I, um, I have to make some calls.”

“What?”

“The building is in his name, I need to call the lawyer, a-and I should call his parents, tell them…”

Sam's looking at him, bewildered and horrified. “Rictor, hey, no. You don't gotta worry about any o’ that right now, okay? Just—”

“No, I-I have to,” he says. He feels… numb. He feels like the scenes he's seen in disaster movies, on the beach, when all the water pulls back and leaves fish and shells and crabs lying in the wet sand, the last moment before a devastating tidal wave crashes down. “I have to take care of this. Um. Thank you for stopping by.”

“No, hey, Ric!” Sam says, trying to wedge his way into the apartment but Julio shuts the door, locks it, leans against it for a second. Like he can lock out Sam and the news he came to deliver.

Shatterstar is dead.

He walks in long strides, moving through his apartment with no real goal or destination. His bones buzz with _something_ , and he feels like his head is full of cotton. Shatterstar is dead.

Rictor's legs stop working and his feet skid across the wooden floor. Desperate for purchase, he grabs the curtain and it comes down with him. The grip causes his fingernails to tear as he collapses, and the curtain falls over him like a shroud. Sam is yelling. Shatterstar is dead.

The world blurs and shakes around Rictor, and he barely registers the sound of Cannonball blasting through the door, but then Sam is kneeling over him, calling his name, eyes wide with worry.

“'Star's dead,” Ric says, shaking so hard that his teeth rattle in his skull. Framed photographs tumble off the walls and crash to the floor. “'Star's dead?”

“Ah'm so sorry,” Sam says, looking around at the damage being done to the building. “We gotta get you outta here, Ric. Okay?”

Ric nods, unable to stop the sob that wrenches out of his throat. He puts his arms around Sam's neck, gets ready to fly away.

Sam makes sure to open the window before blasting off.

* * *

After Ric calms down enough, Sam flies them to the X-Mansion. Sam and Kid Cable have to go talk to Kitty, file field reports, give their full account of the incident. Rictor wanders, feeling lost and out of place, until he finds Tabs sitting in an alcove by a window, her eyes red and puffy.

“Hey,” she says, clearly trying to make an effort for him. Rictor slides into the armchair across from her, folds his hands in his lap, tries not to think about anything.

Finally he lifts his head and says, “Can you tell me what happened, no bullshit? Sam didn't say—”

“Sammy blames himself,” Tabby says, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand. “We, um, we had gotten intel that a bunch of Reavers were hanging out in an abandoned warehouse. We got there, and Kid Cable said wait, but Shatty, he…” She shudders, wipes her eyes again. “See, we had been told there was a kid in there.”

Rictor bobs his head, eyes shut because he's worried if he looks at Tabby's face right now he'll start crying. “Of course. Of fuckin’ course,” he says. “He charged right in without waiting.”

“Yeah,” Tabby says. “And then the whole building just…” She pauses to wipe her eyes again. “There was this huge explosion. Everything just… went up. Shatterstar didn't make it out.”

“Goddamn it,” Julio says, crying in earnest now. He covers his face with his hands, shoulders heaving, and there's not a damn thing Tabitha or anybody else can do. Finally, when he's somewhat recovered, he says, “Somebody needs to tell his parents.”

“Sam’s going to Dazzler's loft as soon as he's done talking to Kitty,” Tabs tells him. “And Dom's the last one who saw Longshot, so she's tracking him down right now.”

Julio nods. Knowing things is a small comfort. Being able to answer some of the questions and concerns swirling around his head. There are too many _why_ and _what if_ questions with no answers. It helps a little bit to answer the easier questions.

“Hey,” Tabs says, suddenly thinking of something. She meets his eyes, looking deadly serious. “You’re, like… _okay_ , right? Sorry, wait, stupid question.” She shakes her head. “Obviously you’re not okay. But you’re… you’re not gonna try anything, right?”

Julio stares at her. “You mean am I gonna put a gun in my mouth?”

“Or climb out on a ledge, or throw yourself into a fight you know you can’t win,” she snaps, eyes still red. “I… I’ll be selfish for a second, kay? You and Shatty are my family. A-and…” Her eyes dart away, because even after crying in front of him, _this_ is still too vulnerable, too raw. “And I can’t lose both of you, okay?”

Rictor reaches out and holds both of her hands with his. “Hey, look at me,” he says, and she tilts her head up. “No. I’m not gonna try anything. I promise.”           

They sit in shared silence until Jean Grey comes walking down the hall, her voice floating through the air. When she spots Tabitha and Rictor, she says into her cell phone, “Listen, Bobby, I'll call you back. Love you. Bye.” She hangs up. “Hey,” she says, sitting down beside Tabitha on the bench. “Nathan told me about Shatterstar.”

Tabitha and Rictor both nod numbly, not sure what to say. Jean loops an arm around Tabitha and leans forward to put a comforting hand on Ric's knee. She doesn't say, _How’re you holding up?_ or any of her typical Momisms, just sits with them quietly.

* * *

Julio stays at Tabitha’s apartment that night, flung across her gaudy thrift store couch, and it’s so similar to the time he crashed there after fighting with ’Star, so similar and so, astronomically different.

* * *

The memorial service takes place two days later, and Julio is meant to give the eulogy. He tried to write one, as if he could possibly explain Shatterstar on a piece of paper, but when he gets up to the podium he has nothing, just this cold emptiness swirling in his chest.

They’re all looking at him, so many sad eyes fixed on him and they’re expecting him to be able to express everything about ’Star and what he meant and the words won’t come, aren’t there, a couple sentences cluster and clog at the back of his throat but they aren’t _enough_ . Nothing is _enough_ to explain how significant, how absolutely fucking _necessary_ Shatterstar was to the world, to Julio.

There are no words. He stands with his hands on the podium and the vibrations come and he can see people looking startled, chairs toppling, and soon enough the ground will open up and—

A hand on his elbow. A voice at his side. “—  here, I’m here, Ric. It’s okay.” Illyana Rasputin stands beside him. He doesn’t know how long she’s been there or how she got up without him noticing, but he’s grateful. He wilts, sags against his friend and teammate, and she steps up to the microphone.

“Um, hello,” Illyana says, tilting the mic down a little. “I, um. I wasn’t on the New Mutants when Shatterstar came to this planet. I actually knew him best through… through his relationships with other people. His friendships with Rahne Sinclair, and Sam Guthrie, and Bobby da Costa. And most of all his relationship with Rictor.” She swallows, looks over at him before continuing. “They have— um, had— the healthiest, most beautiful bond I’ve ever seen. All you had to do was know them to know… to know the love that they shared. And I’m really, really glad I got the chance to know them together, and to know Shatterstar.” She sniffs, looks over again like Rictor might have recovered enough to take back the stand, but he hasn’t. He can’t.

She keeps going. Out in the seats, Alison Blaire sits beside Longshot, holding his hand. She’s wearing an old-fashioned pillbox hat with a veil. It suits her. “Shatterstar did not have an easy life,” Illyana says. “He came from a world where he was treated as property, where he was controlled, abused and used. I don’t know how many of us can relate to that. But I know that I can. And as I came to know Shatterstar… as I came to see how brave, how kind, how _soft_ he had learned to be, it taught me something about myself. Shatterstar proved to me… to everyone… that you can rise above the trauma of your past and be… soft, and kind. That meant a lot to me. That’s what I’ll remember about him.”

* * *

There is nothing to bury, so Julio doesn’t know if it’s supposed to be called a wake or a memorial service or a funeral or what. He zeroes in on this minute detail and tries to ignore everything else. People keep coming up and telling him they’re sorry for his loss. Guido, Logan, Storm, Lorna. _I’m sorry for your loss. I’m so sorry for your loss_ . He wants to yell, wants to scream at them that this loss isn’t just _his_ , it’s _everyone’s_ , the loss is so great and terrible that surely it must be felt by the entire goddamn world.

Jean Grey doesn’t say, “I’m sorry for your loss.” She doesn’t say anything. She just walks up, takes a good look at him, and then sweeps him into a hug, and suddenly Julio is back at the original X-Factor base, 14 and terrified, and Jean is hugging him and telling him that the Right will never, ever get their hands on him again.

They hug for a long time, swaying back and forth on the X-Mansion grounds, and then Jean pulls back, gives him a sad look, and goes back to Ororo’s side.

Jimmy and Terry come up behind Julio then, flanked by the rest of X-Force. Terry puts a hand on his arm. “Let’s get out of here,” she says, and then they’re gone.

Terry’s teleportation is seamless, not prickly and nauseating like Illyana’s. Julio finds himself standing in the Arizona heat, surrounded by his friends— Terry, Jimmy, Sam, Berto and Tabs. The original X-Force kids, or what’s left of them.

“Well that was fucking depressing,” Tabby says, pulling her hair out of its dowdy funeral updo. “Holy shit, Terr, are we…?”

“Yes,” Terry says, regarding the area around them with nostalgia. It’s desert, yes, but parts of it have been overrun with chrome and machinery, barely visible through the layer of sand and dust that’s accumulated over the years. “This was Camp Verde. I wanted to take us somewhere… with better memories of Shatterstar.”

Julio nods, jaw tight. “Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, this is good.”

Jimmy and Sam get a fire going and Tabs decides she’s not going to leave Julio’s side. He tries to find it in himself to complain, but he can’t.

“Everyone was actin’ like they knew him so well,” Sam sighs, staring into the crackling fire. “Ah mean, Ah get it. And Ah’m not mad, exactly, just. They were sad because a guy was dead but they weren’t sad because _Shatterstar_ was dead, ya know?”

“Yeah,” Tabby says. “M and Layla, sure, I get it, but like. Jubes was talking about how sad she was and I just… It’s like how you get sad when a celebrity dies. It feels like that’s how they all felt.”

“The X-Men are a family,” Berto points out. “That’s how they see everyone. That’s how they react to death, like a family.”

“Yeah, but we’re not exactly a family,” Jimmy says. “We’re tighter. We’re more like a gang.”

Julio stares into the flames, hardly seeing them. “I can’t remember the last thing he said to me,” he says. “I just… I can’t remember.” Terry frowns, cocks her head to the side, and then she puts a finger on Julio’s forehead. He jumps back. “Hey, stop it, what’re you doing?”

Her all-white eyes watch him solemnly. “Turn out the light before you come to bed.”

“Huh?”

“That was the last thing Shatterstar said to ye,” she says simply. “He said, ‘Turn out the light before you come to bed.’”

Another wave of aching, splintering _loss_ tears through him, but he just looks down and bobs his head. “Oh,” he says. “Thanks.”

Tabby makes a noise. “Anyone else kinda wigged about Irish’s super-special Morrigan powers?” She raises her hand, as do Sam and Berto. Terry flips her off good-naturedly. It’s almost a normal night. They could almost be teenagers again. It’s almost like everything’s just fine, except it’s the night of Shatterstar’s wake or memorial service or funeral, and nothing is fine.

* * *

“Think I wanna go home,” Julio says, surprising even himself. “Like, home-home. I wanna see my mom.”

“I thought your mom was dead.”

“ _Madre de Dios_ , Tabitha, you ever shut up?” Berto says, but there’s not really that much heat behind it. “He means his stepmom.”

“Yeah,” Julio confirms. “ _Mierda_ , who’s gonna take care of the tenants though?”

“I will,” Jimmy says. When Julio gives him a surprised look, he adds, “You may not be on this iteration of the team, but you’re still X-Force. And we still take care of our own.”  

“What about The Shakedown?” Tabby pipes up. Only she and Sam have actually been to the club, but they all know how protective Ric is of it. How proud.

“I'll look after it,” Terry says. Jimmy makes a noise, and she whirls to glare at him. “What?”

“Hang on, let me check my to-do list,” he says, licking his fingertip and miming riffling through a notebook. “Oh, here it is. ‘Don't let your alcoholic friend run a bar.’”

Terry shoves him playfully, and despite Jimmy's imposing size and strength, he tips over— Morrigan power. “I can handle meself,” she announces. “Haven't ye ever seen ‘Cheers’?”

They're talking and laughing like everything's normal, and Julio feels like it's for his sake, like they're trying to look at the positives of it all. Like this day is not a remembrance of Shatterstar's death but a celebration of Shatterstar's life.

Julio can't fathom celebrating the feeling of having his lungs torn from his chest, the feeling of utter, suffocating solitude.

* * *

Terry says she’ll take him to Guadalajara, but before she does he pulls her aside. “Listen, it’s not just a bar,” he says. “There’s… sometimes kids, mutant kids, need help, need a place to hide. And I do that.”

“Yes,” Terry says. “I can take that responsibility on.”

“Are you sure?”

She smiles. “What do ye think I’ve been doin’ in Europe all this time?”

Rictor says his goodbyes to the team, hugging everyone once more. Tabs comes around for a second hug and reminds him once again not to do anything stupid, and that they’ll all be there for him when he’s ready to come back to New York. And then Terry takes his arm and transports them to Guadalajara.

* * *

His childhood home sits solidly in front of him, looking simultaneously absurd and the most normal sight in the world. After everything… he’s really home again. “Uh, do you wanna come in?” he says, turning to Terry, his ride.

“Nah, I should get back,” Terry says.

“Thank you. For everything.”

She shrugs, smiles. “Mexican-Irish Coalition, right?” Then her face gets more serious and she puts a hand on his shoulder. “Listen, if you need anything— anything at all— just pray, alright? I’ll hear you.”

“Right,” he says. “That’s never gonna stop being weird.”

“I know,” she says, her smile a slice of white in the dusk, and then she’s gone, leaving Julio alone to knock on the door.

He hears his stepmother’s footsteps, and that’s all the time he has to prepare before she opens up the door and gets a look at him. “ _Hola, mamá._ ”

“ _Mijo!_ ” she shrieks, pulling him in for a tight hug, and then he can’t keep face anymore, he breaks, folding over her, clinging on like his mom is the most stable rock in the world.

Right now, she is.

 

 

 

 

In another dimension, within another galaxy, on another planet, on the dusty floor of a cave in the Wildways, Shatterstar comes to.


	2. Quark Keeps the Peace

Shatterstar becomes aware of voices before anything else. The prospect of lifting his eyelids sounds impossible, like there are stones holding them down, so he keeps his eyes shut and stays still, just listening. 

“... like ice, shouldn't we do something to warm him up?” A man's voice, a gruff grumble, low and warm like the hum of an engine. 

Then there's a second, sharper voice, this one female. “He'll recover. Trying to teleport without an anchor made him weak, but with rest, he'll come through.”

“Let's hope you're right. Else you only postponed his death, Spiral.”

_ Spiral _ . The familiarity of the name sends a shock through Shatterstar's system, and he tries harder to move. His whole body feels frozen and far, far too heavy to move. But he  _ has  _ to, can't stay here, motionless and defenseless while Spiral works over him. These are not saviors, then, but captors. It's possible that dying would have been better. 

He grunts, managing to make a noise even though his jaw aches. “He's awake,” the male voice says, and then Shatterstar can feel the stranger leaning over him. “Shatterstar? You hearing me? Do you understand me?”

Shatterstar grunts again, unable to speak, and tries to roll away. He's unable to do that too.

“Take it easy,” the man says. “You put a massive strain on yourself, and tearing you through timespace wasn’t simple. You could have died.” 

Preferable, maybe. There are too many unknown variables now— and one very known, very troubling variable. 

“It's okay,” the man assures him. “I promise, you're safe. I understand you have a bad history with Spiral— who doesn't?” Spiral huffs somewhere behind him. “But you are safe. I swear. Longshot and Ali were dear friends of mine. If you can't trust Spiral, trust me.”

The man is right about one thing.

Shatterstar  _ can’t _ trust Spiral.

 

* * *

 

Movement returns to Shatterstar’s fingers and toes first, then spreads up his arms and legs. He is able to open his eyes and work his jaw, and as soon as he can speak again he does. “Where am I? Who are you?”

“My name’s Quark,” the man says easily. Now that Shatterstar can see him, he recognizes him as a rebel friend of Longshot’s. He resembles a goat, from his curved yellow horns to the gray fur that covers his face and arms, and he wears an eyepatch over his left eye. “You’re in one of our hideouts in the Wildways— unincorporated land outside the Mojo City limits.  _ My _ time, by the way, not yours… as if that makes a difference.”

“Commanded by Mojo I, then,” Shatterstar surmises, pushing himself up to a seated position. His whole body aches, but that’s probably from almost getting blown up and being magicked several dimensions away. “Not Mojo V.”

Quark scowls. “ _ Za’s vid _ , there’s five of them?” He shakes his head. “Hrm. Anyway, Spiral went to get kindling for a fire. Gets cold out here at night. We can talk more when she gets back.”

“We can talk now,” Shatterstar counters. “I can’t stay here. I have to return to Earth.”

Quark sighs. “Let’s just talk about that when Spiral gets back.”

“Talk about what?” Spiral strides back into the cave, two of her arms carrying bundles of bright orange sticks and logs. Shatterstar leaps without thinking, without planning. He snatches one of Quark’s knives from a pouch on the ground and brandishes it. In seconds he has the witch pinned against the cave wall. Sticks and branches tumble to the ground. 

“Take me home,” Shatterstar snarls, the tip of the knife pointed at the vulnerable skin of Spiral’s neck. “Take me to Earth.” 

“I can’t,” she says back with just as much harshness. “Screwloose limited my powers. I need his magics to direct where the dance goes. Trying to travel without him backing me is a game of chance. Saving your life almost  _ killed _ you, not to mention me and Quark.” 

Shatterstar considers that, his eyes flashing in the dim light. “I don’t care about that. Only care about myself.”

Spiral, despite her precarious position, laughs in his face. “Yeah, right, hero.” 

“Enough,” Shatterstar says, pressing the tip of his blade forward. A millimeter more and she will bleed. “Time and space are your domain.  _ Take me _ .”

“Forget it,” Spiral says. “The only way you’re getting home is if you find a way to get there yourself.”

“Deny me again? I’ll—”

A hand on his shoulder, coarse gray fur. “You’ll do nothing,” Quark says sternly, looking between Shatterstar and Spiral. “ _ Za’s vid _ . For once in your miserable existences you’re actually on something resembling the same side. Could you please make an effort to get along?”

Shatterstar scowls, looks between Quark and Spiral. Finally, finally, backs away and drops Quark’s knife. “Tell her,” he demands, looking at the goat-man. He remembers the time they met, briefly, after Mephisto. Quark was there the day Shatterstar figured it all out. “Tell her she has to take me home.”

“She can’t,” Quark says, sounding tired. “She’s right. Trying to make another jaunt with that kind of direction and control, it could kill all of us.” 

So. So he is truly stuck here, then, without a way home. All the fight fades from Shatterstar, leaving behind a numb sense of loss. He is unanchored, unmoored. He nods jerkily at Quark, looks at Spiral, and then sinks to the ground, bundling his knees close to his chest, and does not get up for a long time. 

 

* * *

 

 

“What were you doing stranded in timespace anyway?” Spiral asks, morbid curiosity overcoming her desire for peace and silence. “I found you floating in the time between time, the space between space. Like you tried to teleport and got stuck there.”

Shatterstar curls protectively around the bag of protein mix Quark gave him, glaring across the cave at Spiral. “I was on a mission for X-Force,” he says. “We believed there were children being held hostage inside a warehouse. We thought we were helping someone. We were  _ lied to _ .” 

“That’s what you get for trying to help people.”

“Spiral…” Quark warns.

Shatterstar pauses, the memory of nearly being blown up dancing across his mind. “I didn’t realize it was a trap until it was too late, and I could not run out of the building, so I tried to teleport. But without an anchor…” He drifts off, looking back down at his protein mix. “I have colleagues…  _ friends _ … who can teleport without anchors, who use shortcuts. Even if the shortcut is Hell itself… I suspect it is safer.”

“And I suspect you inherited some of your father’s luck,” Spiral says. “If I had not found you—”

“I still could have made my way out,” Shatterstar says, bristling with anger. It’s an anger Spiral recognizes too well— not genuine, but manufactured to cover up how sad and lost you feel. “I could have gotten back to my home, or back to the site of the explosion after the coast was clear. Instead, you have taken me to another planet in another dimension.”

“This is what I was talking about,” Spiral snaps, standing up and pacing across the cave floor. “This is why I don’t try to  _ help _ . Where is the gratitude? Where is the appreciation? I saved your  _ life _ , insolent boy, and all you can focus on is where I brought you afterward.” 

Shatterstar tosses his nearly empty bag of protein mix on the ground and pushes himself up to his feet. “You brought me to  _ Mojoworld _ . What am I meant to assume? And how do I know you aren’t doing all this on Mojo’s orders?”

“She’s not! We’re not,” Quark says, standing between them with his arms spread in an attempt to mediate and break up the argument. “Look, Shatter, you know Spiral hates Mojo as much as you and I do. Besides, our Mojo, Mojo I? He doesn't know you from Adam X. You don't have anything to worry about.”

Shatterstar runs a hand across his tired face, frustrated and longing for home. “I don't have anything to worry about,” he repeats caustically. “Except that I am stranded on another planet in an alternate dimension with a woman who despises me.”

If Spiral agrees or disagrees with that statement, she gives no indication of either.

 

* * *

 

Nighttime on Mojoworld. The fire dims, crackling. It is not earthly, not quite mystical, something unique to the Wildways. Purple jumps with the blue and orange of the flame. Shatterstar sits bowled forward, his hands around his ankles, making himself small. 

During the past hours, he has done what he can to assess the situation. Stranded on Mojoworld with one of his most dreaded enemies and a man he hardly knows. The last thing he remembers is the explosion, and he has no way of knowing if any of his teammates were caught in the blast. Sam, Tabitha, Jimmy— are they okay? Do they believe him dead? 

Does Julio?

Quark and Spiral are sleeping, and though they told him that Mojo’s forces don’t come out this far, that they require no lookout, he insisted on staying awake. He’s spent too much of his life fighting Mojo to forget his training entirely. 

But he cannot sit here and do nothing, not when he finally has an idea of how to return home. Shatterstar rolls back and pushes himself up, storms into the cave where his… traveling companions… rest. 

The time dancer and the goat-man sleep on opposite sides of the cave, backs pressed against the stone, as far away from each other as they can get. Shatterstar wonders about that, but shrugs off the curiosity.

He takes a second look at Spiral. Even asleep, her face does not look peaceful. It rests frozen in a mask of uncertainty and bitterness, just as it does during her waking hours. The idea of slitting her throat passes through his mind, just the briefest thought. A fighter’s thought, a thought from Before. He dismisses it and turns to Quark. 

Quark doesn’t wear his eyepatch while sleeping. It sits balled up next to him, exposing his eye, which bears a star mark similar to Shatterstar’s own. Shatterstar has never thought to cover his the way Quark does. He wonders if that is significant. Then, he kicks Quark’s leg to wake him up. 

Quark jerks awake, spluttering. “Shatterstar? Are we under attack?”

“No,” Shatterstar says brusquely. “Get up.” 

He leads Quark back outside and sits beside the fire, sliding back into his original position. Quark stands to the side, looking at him. He did not put his eyepatch back on when he awoke. Shatterstar stares at him until he sits. 

“What is it?” Quark asks, rubbing grogginess from his eyes. “Is something wrong?”

“Everything is wrong,” Shatterstar says. “I am here. I should be home. You are going to take me there.”

Quark laughs bitterly. “Can’t do that. I can’t open portals for you, can’t—”

“You don’t have to,” Shatterstar says. “I can move through time and space, but I require an anchor. My anchor must be connected to me.” He makes a noise, exasperated and weary. “You understand? You see? We will connect. You will anchor me, and I will go home.”

“Connect,” Quark repeats slowly. “Uh, okay, I know I may not look it but I do have  _ some _ class, and I’m not going to sleep with my friends’ son.” 

Shatterstar waves away his concerns. “Sex is not connection. Connection is…  _ connection _ ,” he says, struggling to find the right words. “Connection to Julio because he loves me. Connection to Longshot because he is family. Connection to Layla Miller because she knows me. You are not family and I do not love you, but you can know me, and I can know you. We will connect.”

Quark stares at him, something old and sad in his eyes. Shatterstar chooses to ignore it. “Okay, fine,” Quark sighs. “Let’s connect.”

 

* * *

 

Quark tells him about Arize and Longshot and the rebellion. He speaks of traveling to Earth after Longshot, of turning on Magog and Mojo's forces. He speaks of Spiral as both ally and enemy, and Shatterstar doesn't know what to make of it. 

Quark gets to the part of his tale where Dazzler and Longshot have begun leading the rebelliom against Mojo I. 

“We were all thrilled when Alison and Longshot told us they were pregnant,” Quark says. “It was like… hope, you know? A new life, a life that wouldn’t be controlled by Mojo. We were separated during a fight… that shouldn’t have happened.” He scowls, and old ghosts dance across his face. “We rescued Longshot, and Alison turned up not long after, but something was… different. I mean, the obvious thing was Alison wasn’t pregnant. We all asked her what happened, asked her if she’d had the baby during the fight, but… it was like she didn’t know what we were talking about.”

Shatterstar thinks about toying with his parents’ minds like kinetic slime, molding and shaping them, thinks about an infant with a black star on his eye, says nothing. 

“We— me and the other rebels, I mean— we figured Alison lost the baby and just wasn’t saying. Trauma, or some kind of post-partum depression.” Quark sighs. “But then Longshot didn’t even remember her ever being pregnant. And then we could pretty much piece it together.” He laughs without humor. “Mojo, Major Domo, one of them— must’ve rewired their brains. Taken the kid and done Za-knows-what. That new life… was just another victim of Mojo.” His eyes shift then and he looks at Shatterstar. “It wasn’t until much, much later that I ever learned what became of that kid. That he was a freedom fighter, just like his parents. You’re a lot like them, you now, Shatterstar,” he says. “People probably tell you all the time how you’re like Longshot, but there’s so much of your mother in you, as well.” 

He tries to think about what she would do, were she in his shoes. How would she get back home?

The answer is simple: Alison Blaire wouldn't go back home.

She was always exploring, sinking her teeth into every adventure she could get her hands on. She'd join Quark and Spiral in a heartbeat and never look back, only pausing occasionally to spare a thought for the X-Men and her friends left on Earth. 

Shatterstar may be like his mother, but not in that respect. He is like the girl Dorothy in  _ The Wizard of Oz _ , a film Tabitha one made him watch concurrently with Pink Floyd's  _ Dark Side of the Moon _ album. He is like Dorothy. 

He just wants to go home.

 

* * *

 

They hole up in the Wildways cave for three nights’ rest, dining on the protein supplements Quark has on hand. Shatterstar spends much of his time trying to form a bond with Quark, enough of a connection that he can use it to go home. He avoids Spiral as much as he can, and she seems to do the same.

They are interrupted from their feeble little dinner when a horde of Spineless Ones arrives over the crest of a nearby hill, clicking and yammering on about capturing slaves and rebels. “ _ Fekt _ ,” Spiral curses, grabbing her swords. “I don’t have the energy or the power to take us anywhere else, but I can jaunt us a couple weeks into the future to get away from those slugs.”

Quark packs up the rations and his tools, snuffing out their campfire mechanically, almost rehearsed. It’s evident that this isn’t the first time he and Spiral have had to flee from an oncoming threat. Shatterstar wonders how long they’ve been running together like this. 

Spiral begins her dance, her arms circling around her, the metal of her armor and swords flashing. A portal appears above her head and begins to widen, growing to encompass the three of them. 

Just as Shatterstar feels the familiar sensation of being yanked into timespace, it occurs to him that this could be his way home, that maybe he doesn’t need to connect with Quark after all. Rivers of time and space flow and coalesce around them, and Spiral guides him and Quark like a ship’s captain.

So Shatterstar jumps ship.

He is a teleporter, after all, and no stranger to traveling through the galaxies. All he has to do is picture home… picture the rickety old apartment building in Queens… picture Julio… where he is, what he might be doing right now. 


	3. Yolanda Richter Returns Home

The morning after he arrives in Mexico, Julio is woken up by his stepmom bringing him flapjacks in bed, plus a giant mug of coffee. “Good morning,” she says, quieter than normal, like she doesn’t want to spook him. She sits on the edge of his bed and sets the plate of pancakes in his lap, forcing him to sit up a little to keep the stack from toppling. 

He didn’t actually tell her last night  _ why _ he’d shown up on her doorstep, an emotional wreck, wracked with grief. She’s not pushing, but he knows he’s going to have to go through it all soon. For now, though, he just wants to focus on the food in front of him and the hot cup of coffee his mom sets on the nightstand. 

“I haven’t seen your hair so short in a long time,” she comments, combing her fingers through his hair. “Looks good.”

“Thanks, Momma.” 

She sits with him and makes idle chit-chat about neighbors and cousins while he works on eating. It’s been so hard to remind himself to do shit like this— regular meals, shaving, simple taking-care-of-himself tasks. It’s not like he was a paragon of self-care last week, but losing ’Star has made everything ten times harder. For the past couple of days, Sam and Jean (and Tabitha, sort of) have been rotating around him making sure he eats and sleeps and isn’t left alone. 

No one mothers like your own mother, though. 

* * *

His mom takes the empty plate and mug when he’s done and leaves him alone in his old room, presumably to get cleaned up and changed. It occurs to him suddenly that he didn’t actually bring anything— no clothes, no toothbrush, no nothing. Last night he slept in his undershirt and boxers, and his funeral outfit is hanging over a chair on the other side of the room.

This was his bedroom, once upon a time. If he opens the closet, he’s pretty sure he’ll find a bunch of ratty jeans and tank tops stacked up on the top shelf. For a bizarre moment, he considers trying to fit into one of his outfits from when he was thirteen, the last time he lived in this room. Ultimately, he settles for tugging on the suit pants and going downstairs in those and his undershirt. 

“Ay, Julio,” his mother says when she sees him. “Carlos should have some clothes in his room that fits you. He’s in Costa Rica right now, I’m sure he won’t mind.” 

“Right,” Julio says, scratching the back of his neck and trying not to think about what his step-brother might be doing in Costa Rica. His relationship with his family, especially after he and ’Star took out a majority of the Richter gun-running business, is incredibly tense. He’s glad of the fact that he has clothes to wear, but wonders what might happen if Carlos comes back from Costa Rica and finds the family traitor raiding his dresser. 

* * *

After showering and changing into some of Carlos’ clothes, Julio ghosts through his old bedroom, eyes roaming over relics of his childhood. He finally settles on his bookcase, running his thumb along the spine of one of the battered adventure novels he used to read over and over as a kid. They’re all lined up on the shelf, like they were waiting for him to come home. There’s a single book of Neruda poems from his birth mother at the end of that line, looking pristine despite the fact that he’d opened it many, many times before.

A shelf above the novels, top left, his old comic books sit collecting dust. The pages of Watchmen and Teen Titans were some of his first English lessons, those and the movies and television he watched sometimes as a kid. 

The first person to speak English directly to him was Cameron Hodge. 

Julio shivers despite the warmth of the room, and he finds himself thinking of another language, the one Shatterstar shared with him. The language of the Cadre Alliance. 

Julio is now the last person on Earth who speaks the language. “ _ I miss you, my heart _ ,” he says quietly, in Cadre, into the empty room. The Cadre word for “heart” is more of an anatomical term, doesn’t mean the same as when he would call ’Star  _ mi corazón _ . He thinks ’Star would have understood what he meant, though. 

* * *

“Julio!” his mother calls from downstairs. “Come and help me dust the ceiling fan.”

While he sweeps his mother’s dust rag over the ceiling fan blades, Julio reflects on the prospect of telling her what happened, and why he’s come home. 

It’s not like he has to come out again. His mother already knows about him, knew about Shatterstar. That’s the coldest comfort he can think of right now. He dusts, and he feels the ache in his chest sharpen like the prickling tears behind his eyes. 

“Looks good,” his mother approves, swiping a finger across one blade of the ceiling fan. “Come sit, come sit with me.” 

Julo sinks into the couch next to her, sitting upright at first before giving in and leaning into her arms. With his stepmother’s arms warm and secure around him, he feels safe in a way he never really got to as a child. In between the gunrunning family and his own childhood insecurities, he always felt a little out of place at home, even when he was cuddling on the couch with his mom. 

It’s never been like this before. Like he just… belongs here. Home actually feels like home. And all he had to do was show up heartbroken and grieving. 

“So,” his mother says, combing her fingers through his hair, “are you going to tell me why you’re here?” 

“What, I can’t just… I need a reason to visit my mamá? I mean…” His voice breaks. 

“What happened?” his mother asks him, pulling him closer, holding him tighter. “Was it the X-Men?”

She doesn't know everything about his life, but she knows pieces. She knows that he knows Storm and Jean Grey, and that all his friends are mutants, and that he used to be on some kind of team. She's put some pieces together over the years. 

“No… no, it wasn't connected to the stuff you're seeing on the news,” he says. “It…” Why is it so hard to say? It's not like speaking the words out loud will make the love of his life any more dead. 

His mother's face softens. “Is it about Shatterstar?”

He breaks, leaning into her and crying full-out, so much that he can barely speak and his nose runs and his eyes get puffy. “He's dead,” he manages in between heaving sobs, “Shatterstar is dead.”

His mother runs a gentle hand through his hair, doesn't tell him to calm down, doesn't try to tell him that she understands, even though she does. All she has to do is hold him. 

* * *

A day later, somebody comes into the house without bothering to knock or ring the doorbell. “Hello?” Julio says, stepping out from the kitchen to see who it is. “What’re you doin’ here?”

“What, no hug for your youngest sister?” Yolanda asks, crossing her arms. 

“My youngest sister is about… this tall,” Julio responds, holding a hand near his waist. “ _ Madre de Dios _ , what happened to you?” He goes in for a hug. Instead of pigtails, Yolanda wears her hair in a long ponytail now. 

“That’s what happens when you don’t visit for years, stupid,” she says, but warmly, hugging him back. “I’m a grown-up now. Even started college this year.”

“College?” Julio whistles. “Lemme guess. Baseball scholarship.” He still remembers the time she was seven, demanded she get to play baseball with her brothers and beaned herself right on the forehead with her first pitch. 

Yolanda shoves him. “I  _ did _ get a scholarship. I wrote an essay.”

“I’m not surprised,” he says, flicking her ponytail. “I’m proud of you, nerd.” 

Yolanda digs out the chips in the pantry, and she and Julio catch up over the kitchen table. He tells her about Queens and his club, dancing around the real reason he came back home. She talks about her classes, and how well she gets along with her roommate.

“Mamá told me you were here,” she admits after awhile. “I had to come see for myself. It’s been so long, Hooly.”

“I know,” he says, flipping a plantain chip over and over in his hand without eating it. “I… I kept meaning to get back down here, but stuff happened, things got in the way.” It’s a lame excuse, even if it is mostly true. 

“Well. I mean.” She sighs. “It’s not that I didn’t wanna see you, because of course I did. But I was also sort of… sent here. To see how you were doing, and report back.” He raises an eyebrow at her. “Omar wants to know how you’re doing.”

Right. Omar. His favorite cousin, and his first best friend. Last time he saw the guy, Ric was telling him he belonged in prison. “He’s been out for…”

“Five years, now,” she says. “He’s not  _ mad _ at you, you know. Just. He thinks you hate him.”

“I don’t hate him.” 

“You should tell him that,” Yolanda says. She really has grown up, more than just getting taller. There’s a seriousness behind her eyes that he doesn’t remember in the kid whose dolls he used to throw down the stairs. “Anyway, Mamá wants to have a big family dinner now that you’re home. But you should probably meet up with Omar first so you can at least talk one-on-one, you know?”

A big family dinner. His mom must’ve planned that before she knew about what happened to Shatterstar. Or maybe she thinks the best way for Julio to grieve is surrounded by family. 

Maybe it is. Or maybe it would be, if he wasn’t just about as estranged as he can possibly be from the rest of his relatives. “Yeah,” he sighs, looking at his little sister. “You’re probably right.” 

* * *

That night, Julio awakes from a dream only to find he’s been crying in his sleep. And not just crying— several of the books from his bookcase are lying on the floor, and a framed photograph of his parents has crashed off the wall, leaving broken glass scattered across the carpet.

“Julio,” his mother says from the doorway, not frightened by his display of powers, just concerned. “Nightmare?”

No. No, it hadn’t been a nightmare at all. His dream had been so, so nice. He was with Shatterstar, walking through a sunlit park. The grass was a vibrant green and the breeze was soft, ruffling ’Star’s hair just a little. They were holding hands, and smiling, and most importantly— Shatterstar was alive. 

“No, I was… we were together,” he chokes out, sitting up in bed and swiping furiously at his tear-stained cheeks. “In my dream, ’Star was with me, he was still alive… Mamá, I miss him so much. It’s… it’s like I can’t breathe…”

“I’m here,  _ mijo _ ,” she sighs, sitting beside him on the bed, wrapping one arm around his trembling shoulders and pulling him close. She smells like her favorite flowery lotion, and her shoulder is just as good a place to cry as it was when he was ten years old. He clings to his mother and lets the dream fade.

* * *

Even after he has calmed down, Julio can’t even think about going back to sleep. Sleeping means dreaming, and if he sees Shatterstar again in his dreams (which he will) he’s just going to lose it. So he watches TV instead of going back to bed.

At this hour, all that’s on (besides evangelists and ads for phone sex hotlines) is old sitcom reruns. He lets them play, one after the other, tuning them in and out but making sure to stay awake. 

But he must have fallen asleep at some point.

Surely, he must have fallen asleep. How else can he explain the sound of Shatterstar’s voice interrupting the vacuum cleaner infomercial on TV? How can he explain the fact that he hears, with stunning clarity, “ _ Julio, I’m alive _ ,” before the late night infomercial resumes?

It’s just another dream, has to be. There’s no other explanation. 

He changes the channel to another rerun, tries to put it all out of his head. Wishful thinking, coupled with late night TV, coupled with exhaustion and grief… 

_ Julio, I’m alive _ .

It has to just be a dream. 


	4. Jamie Madrox Tends Bar

Shatterstar has never seen Spiral angrier at him, and that’s a mind-shaking concept. “You  _ cannot _ go hurtling off into the dimensional void, ridiculous child! Don’t you understand?”

When Shatterstar jumped into the void between dimensions, certain he could guide himself, it felt like the time Tabitha had tried to teach him to body surf. He’d gone under, thrashing around hopelessly in the black water, unable to tell which way was up, unable to thrust his head above water and breathe. He’d washed ashore that day hacking up salt and sand, with Tabitha checking to make sure he was fine before laughing. 

This time, he’d dragged both Quark and Spiral down with him. And, irony of ironies, when they finally washed ashore they were, in fact, on what appears to be a beach. Spiral and Shatterstar stand surrounded by palm fronds, smooth stones and blindingly white sand. Quark is nowhere to be seen, and Shatterstar feels a pit of guilt lodge in his gut. 

“You have no idea what can happen to you, jumping into the void between dimensions like that,” Spiral goes on, furious. “The things you see, the way it tears at your psyche. You risk not your life, you risk your  _ uemer _ . Risk not only your future, but your past as well. Your  _ self _ .” She seems exhausted and torn apart but still she shrieks at him. “The twist of time and space will pour into your soul like it did to me, and then where will you be? You have to  _ think about these things _ , Shatterstar.”

“I’m… sorry,” he says when she pauses for breath. “I didn’t know. I didn’t think.”

“You’re goddamn right you didn’t think,” she hisses, two of her hands on her hips while she uses the other four to gesticulate wildly at him, orchestrating her anger in heavy strokes. “I told you I couldn’t take you home, and I  _ meant _ it. I wasn’t lying. Did you think I was lying? Now we’re stuck here, because I don’t know how to get us anywhere else.  _ Fool _ .” 

Shatterstar slinks back from her, bowing his head as her lecture continues. While she speaks, he tries to take stock of where they’ve landed. 

Finally, finally, Spiral’s rage quiets to a dull roar, and she wanders off in search of food, and answers, and Quark, wherever he’s landed in this dimension. Shatterstar walks through the scrubby brush around him, plants rooted in silt and sand. He smells sea air and hears the crash of waves somewhere nearby. 

He walks until the sun on his neck begins to sting, and then he spies a reprieve in the form of a thatched hut. A sign above the structure proclaims it to be Bobbie’s Beach Bar— The Bar With No Shame. 

And there are people.

Shatterstar marches right up to the bar, thirsty and tired and desperate to interact with someone besides Spiral and Quark. There’s another patron standing at the bar with his back to Shatterstar. As he draws closer, though, the man leaning against the bar grows familiar. Leaner and slighter than Shatterstar remembers, and wearing his hair long, but unmistakable.

His heart catches in his throat, and his first attempt at calling the man’s name is swallowed. He tries again. “Julio?”

The man turns around and he  _ is _ Julio, looking bemused and beautiful, his dark hair hanging loose around his face, swim trunks snug on his waist, his naturally rich skin darkened by the sun. Shatterstar doesn’t even think, just grabs him and sweeps him into a deep kiss, because there are so many things he wants to say but he wants to kiss Julio most of all. 

Julio’s mouth feels odd against his, more hesitant than would be expected. Has Shatterstar been away too long? Has their connection dulled and faded? He backs away, mind racing, to find Julio looking up at him, bewildered but not unhappy. “Nice to meet you too,” Julio says appreciatively, a hand reaching up to skim across his own lips in awe. “Where’d you come from?”

“The interstitial void,” Shatterstar says, and then, “I love you.” 

“Damn, okay,” Julio says, just looking amused and nothing else, and suddenly this is all wrong, wrong, wrong. Not nightmare-wrong or Mojo-wrong, but wrong like pulling on your favorite pair of sweatpants and finding them suddenly four sizes too big. Wrong like opening the door to your apartment and stepping into the home of a stranger. “That, uh, how they say hello on your world?”

“My world…” Shatterstar says, trying to make sense of all this, wanting to say,  _ We share the same world _ , or maybe,  _ You are my world, Julio _ . “I don’t understand.”

“No, it’s cool, I’m just not used to guys coming up and kissing me like that,” Julio shrugs. “It’s not  _ unwelcome _ , I mean. But I don’t even know your name.”

Shatterstar’s stomach drops. “You know my name.”

Julio looks at him, eyebrows pinched together. “I’m sorry, I don’t.” 

“You do,” Shatterstar insists, feeling something cold and despairing rise in him, feeling like he has raced across the multiverse to find Julio and instead found a stranger. “You  _ know  _ me. How can you—”

“Save it, Red,” the bartender says, looking up from the counter he’s been wiping down. Shatterstar recognizes him too— Jamie Madrox, minus the M brand over his eye. “That guy you’re talking to is just a piece of whoever you want it to be. Don’t worry. Happens to the best of us.”

“Whatever,” Julio says, acting like he hasn’t heard Jamie. “Listen, I’ll be down by the shore playing volleyball. Meet me later?”

“Uhm. Yes,” Shatterstar says, confused. Julio shakes his head at him one last time and then runs off, kicking up sand behind his bare feet. “Explain this,” Shatterstar demands, turning to the bartender.

“You’re on the beach.”

“Tch. Obviously,” Shatterstar says, lip curling. 

Jamie sighs. “No, I mean you’re on The Beach.” Shatterstar still is not understanding. “Have you ever walked along the shore looking for shells? You see all these things— driftwood, seaglass, pieces of oyster shells, pieces of cowrie shells. The ocean tosses them around and drops them off on the shore, all these bits and pieces from all over the world. That’s where you are right now. So many pieces of people get cast off into the multiverse and… this is where they end up.” He looks up at Shatterstar sympathetically. “D’you want a drink?”

“Please,” Shatterstar says. “Vodka and rocks.”

* * *

After having a drink or two and trying to talk to Jamie-Who-Isn’t-Quite-Jamie, Shatterstar decides to bury his pride and go catch up with Spiral. Tempting as it is, he can’t actually spend the rest of his life hanging out at a transdimensional tiki bar.

He  _ does _ ask for a strawberry daiquiri to go, though, and then, in what he hopes is an appreciative gesture, gets a second one for Spiral. 

After weaving around the sunbathers dotting the shore (some of them resemble his teammates and friends, but he tries not to look too closely), Shatterstar finally tracks down Spiral. She’s perched on a smooth boulder overlooking the incoming tide, her brow furrowed, completely focused on scratching some kind of pattern into the stone, using a white shell for a stylus. 

“What are you doing?” he asks. 

She does not jump or startle. She heard him coming, somehow, though his footsteps are as quiet as ever. “Calculations,” she mutters, scribbling something out. “Interdimensional transportation figures. I’ve been trying to determine whether I can actually take us  _ away _ from this forsaken beach, and so far I have come up with nothing.”

Shatterstar holds out her drink. “I brought you a beverage.”

Spiral stares at it warily, like she thinks it might be poisoned, but then she takes it and sucks down a sip. “This is what you’ve been doing while I’ve been searching for Quark and trying to find a way to leave? You’ve been hanging out at the bar?”

“Where is Quark, anyway?” he asks, ignoring her vitriol.

Spiral waves one of her hands dismissively. “He found a…  _ version _ of Dr. Stephen Strange. They’ve been chatting.” 

“Oh.” Shatterstar sits down on the rock beside her, sips his daiquiri, thinks. “Spiral… why do you care so much whether I live or die?” He still hasn’t fathomed why she rescued him from being trapped in timespace. And he doesn’t know why she became so angry with him when he took off while they were portaling. 

“I’m very invested in Mojo being dead,” she says, shrugging. “You were prophesied to kill him. I need to keep you alive until you do.” 

“Is that all?”

Spiral carves angry lines into the stone, not meeting his eyes. “No,” she says finally, quietly. “That’s not all.” 

“Then what—?”

“You’re like me,” Spiral says to him. “We are mirrors.” Waves crash against the slick stones beneath them. “I was human, then twisted into one of Mojo's tools. You began as a tool of Mojo. But you changed, became something more, became human. I envy you, Shatterstar,” she says. “But I am also… so very proud of you.”

Shatterstar ruminates on that for a moment, lets it sit and simmer. This woman, this villain, is  _ proud  _ of him. He oscillates between being appreciative and being horrified. What must he have done that would make a woman like Spiral feel proud? 

“I forget,” he says finally, “I forget, often, that you were human once.” It’s a fact he knows, intellectually, but it rarely factors in when he thinks about Spiral, and her past as a revolutionary alongside Longshot. 

Her mouth twists into a grimace. “I had fewer arms then,” she says drily. “I had a dog.”

“You did?” he perks up.

She almost laughs. “Yeah. His name was Saxophone.”

“Saxophone,” Shatterstar repeats. To him, it’s not really a strange name for a dog. No weirder than the name “Shatterstar,” honestly. 

“Yeah,” Spiral says, setting her white shell aside, done, for the moment, with teleportation metrics. “Yeah, Saxophone. And my name…  _ my _ name was Rita.” She dusts her hands off and stands up. 

“Where are you going?”

“I’m going to hunt down something to eat,” she announces. “There’re bound to be voles or space-voles or squirrels or… or, space-squirrels.”

“Well,” Shatterstar points out, “that tiki bar has food.”

* * *

 

When Spiral comes back, she has a cardboard container full of chicken fingers and French fries. And Shatterstar has questions. 

“I want to know more about you,” he says. “The old you. Before Mojo.” 

Spiral smirks and sits down. She peels open a container of dipping sauce. “Now that you remember I have a tragic backstory, you want to have a heart-to-heart? Fine.” She rips a chicken finger in half, dips it, takes a bite. When she’s done chewing, she tells him, “Actually, I grew up a little like you. The nicest, G-rated version of your childhood. I was… Rita Wayword was a rodeo baby. Living in the spotlight since age 3.” 

She tells him about growing up, about her brother Tim and her parents, about Texas and about New York. She tells him about her dog, and about making movies. And she tells him about meeting Longshot. 

Spiral usually speaks of Longshot with derision and disgust. But now, talking about the time she first met him… she almost looks wistful. 

The more she talks, the more it occurs to Shatterstar that Spiral’s never actually been all that secretive. Everything she’s telling him— they aren’t secrets, or huge revelations. Only things that no one has ever bothered to ask. 

“Rita looked after the X-Babies, once upon a time,” Spiral says, dipping a chicken finger in what looks like Polynesian sauce. “She thought they were charming… these little animation cels, created for big laughs, and then turning out just like Longshot. Little rebels.”

“Why do you speak of Rita like she's someone else?” Shatterstar asks. 

Spiral’s jaw tightens. “She is,” Spiral says. Shatterstar opens his mouth to contradict her but Spiral keeps talking. “Why do you not call yourself Benjamin Russell? You two were the same person.”

She says the last sentence with a strange shade to her voice, like she's lying— or like she's testing him. 

“Benjamin Russell gave me the greatest gift anyone can give,” Shatterstar says. “He gave me my life back, gave me a second chance. He was in a coma, alone, for years… the only thing he owned was his body, and he gave it to me.” He looks down at his hands— Benjamin Russell's hands, Benjamin Russell's fingers. “I would not be so bold as to take his name as well as his body.”

“Well, you see,” Spiral says, the reflection of the setting sun shining in her eyes. “It's the same with me.”

“It isn't,” Shatterstar argues. “Yours is the same body.”

“If you replace every plank of a ship, is it still the same ship?” she muses.

* * *

 

Eventually, Quark catches up with them, cradling a basket of corn chips and guacamole. “Can Strange help us?” Spiral asks, sneaking a chip and some guac without Quark seeing. 

“No,” Quark says. “At least, if he can, he won’t. He’s quite enjoying lying on the beach. Everyone here is so relaxed. I hate it.” 

“Great,” Spiral grumbles. “ _ Fekt _ . How the hell are we supposed to get anywhere now?”

“’Scuuuuuse me,” someone says from behind Quark, walking along the beach. “I couldn’t help but overheard. ’Cause I was eavesdropping. But it sounds like you could use a taxi service.” The voice is familiar to Shatterstar, as is the woman’s jet-black hair and distressed tank top. 

“Lila Cheney?” 

“Heyyy,” she says, shooting him double finger guns. “I’m not doin’ anything right now. I could help?” 

Spiral stands up immediately, dusting off her hands. “Anywhere but this Godforsaken beach.”

“Earth,” Shatterstar says. 

Lila’s face falls. “Nah, I can't take you to Earth,” the rockstar explains. Shatterstar’s expression clouds over, and she sighs, leaning down to point out some shells on the sand. “See this little piece of seaweed? That's us, on The Beach. An’ see this spirally shell? Like, a few inches away? That's Earth. I only teleport long distance. As in, way way way long distance.”

She walks backward, moving along the beach for almost a full minute until they can barely make out her features, just a silhouette against the setting sun. “I can probably get you somewhere out here! Relatively speaking,” Lila Cheney explains, having to shout. 

“We… we could go  _ back  _ to Mojoworld,” Spiral suggests, though she looks like she detests the idea.

“What about Mojo?” Quark says.

“He's still on Earth with Major Domo, overseeing his Mojo News Network. If we try to jaunt from here, there's no telling where we might end up. But of I get a boost from one of Screwloose's dimensional supercomputers, I could actually take us somewhere useful,” Spiral explains. “Instead of  _ flying off half-cocked _ ,” she adds, glaring pointedly at Shatterstar. 

“I just want to go home,” Shatterstar says. “To Earth.” 

Spiral looks equal parts annoyed and perplexed. “What is your obsession with Earth? I'm saying we could go anywhere in the multiverse. You want to go back to that dull wasteland. I don't understand it. You never even  _ fit _ there, Shatterstar, none of us do.”

“Maybe not,” he says quietly. “But my family and friends are there. And Julio. He has always made me feel like I ‘fit,’ even when I didn't.”

* * *

Later, while Spiral is still fuming, Quark pulls Shatterstar aside. “I understand you wanting to go back to Earth. Sort of,” he says. “I just… I don't want you to go because you feel obligated, or like you have no place here. If you were to stay, I—  _ we _ — would have a place for you.” He smiles, showing off his wide, flat teeth. “Hell, I might be the closest thing you have to a godfather. So. Something to think about.”

Shatterstar does think about it. Traversing the multiverse with Spiral and Quark certainly sounds exciting, but he doesn't want exciting. He want Julio. He wants home. 

“I appreciate the gesture,” Shatterstar says. “But I belong on Earth.”

 

Quark makes sure that Lila has the right coordinates. “Now,” she warns them, “I can’t guarantee that I’ll get you back there in the same, ah, time period you left? It’s just this place, The Beach. It’s like launching yourself out of a temporal pinball machine. There’s barely any control, and I’m not actually a time traveler by trade, ya know.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Spiral scowls. “I can’t be here any longer. I am getting sand in my boots.”

“You got it, boss.” Lila says. She begins to glow. 

Shatterstar stands between Quark and Spiral and thinks about home, feeling hopeless. He wonders if Rictor is thinking about him, wherever he is in the vastness of the multiverse. 

Rictor loves him. Rictor loves him, Rictor loves him, Rictor loves him. He will carry that close to his chest like a talisman, like it is the most precious thing he owns, because maybe it is. Rictor loves him, and he will carry that fact all the way home, if he can ever get there. 


	5. Omar Domingo Richter Feeds the Chickens

Julio carries a basket of clean clothes into his mother’s room, and once he’s in there it’s like going back in time. She hasn’t redecorated in years, and everything looks the same— her jewelry box, her vanity, her bedframe with the peeling paint. Everything looks like it did on That Night. 

_ “I suspected,” Mamá says, clasping his shaking hands in her own, “I suspected it was you, mijo. When the reports first started coming in about the outposts getting taken out.” _

_ “I’m sorry,” Julio says, frantic. He’s crying, and he hates himself for it. “I just… I had to…” _

_ “Shh, it’s okay,” she says, hugging him, one hand stroking his hair. “I get it. And you were right, Julio. You were right, before. What they’re doing… it isn’t alright. That’s why I got out.”  _

_ “Y-you listened to me?” When he told his mother how upset he was that she was continuing in the family gun business, he never expected her to take him seriously.  _

_ “I did,” she says. “But your uncles won’t.” As if on cue, the front door bangs open downstairs. “That’s Gonzalo. You need to go.” _

_ “I don’t… I don’t know where to go,” Julio admits. “My friend who was with me, he’s…” We broke up. “He’s gone. He left. I’m alone now and… and I don’t know what to do now.”  _

_ “Go back to the States,” she tells him. “Go back to your X-Men, mijo. And remember that I love you. And you will always be my son.”  _

That night, he’d scrambled down the side of the house from her balcony, gotten into his truck and driven north until he couldn’t see straight anymore. As soon as he hit Arizona, he called Sam Guthrie— for lack of any better ideas— and wound up on X-Corp. 

Life is funny, Rictor thinks, as he puts his mom’s blouses away in the bottom drawer of her dresser. The tiny TV on her dresser is on, blaring some commercial through its tinny speakers. As he reaches to turn it off, though, suddenly the screen fuzzes over. 

“ _... love you… _ ”

The speakers are crappy, and the message is staticky, but it’s unmistakable. And it’s in English, too, which doesn’t make much sense unless—

“Julio!” his mother calls. “Are you finished with the laundry? Omar’s here.”

* * *

 

Julio and his cousin parted on such poor terms that he’s not sure what to expect from their reunion— if reunion is even the right word. “Confrontation” might be more apt. At the very least, he’s expecting to get punched in the face. 

The moment Omar sees him, his face splits into a huge grin. “Julio!” he shouts, racing toward Julio and pulling him into a hug, clapping him on the shoulder. “ _ Dios _ , I missed you. Look at your hair! You’re lookin’ sharp, man.” 

“I missed you, too,” Julio says, confused but happy to hug back. “What, uh… Um, so what’ve you…?” There’s no way to phrase it that doesn’t feel awkward and uncomfortable. 

Fortunately, Omar’s never been one for beating around the bush. “You tryin’ to ask what I’ve been doin’ since prison?” Julio nods. “Well. I went to night school. I’m in IT now.” 

Somehow it’s the furthest thing from what Julio was expecting. “What, like… IT like computers?”

“Nah, like the scary clown with the red balloon. Yes, computers,  _ estúpido _ .” Omar thumps him lightly on the chest and pushes past him to get to the basket of oranges on the kitchen counter. “You remember all that time you and me spent playing Oregon Trail? I must’ve died of dysentery like a hundred times. Anyway. And now look at me, the computer guy.” 

“Good for you,” Julio says, leaning against the counter. “I, uh, I was in the computer biz for a little, too.”

“You?” Omar says, raising an eyebrow. “I thought you were all about, that… you know…” He puts his hands together in a gun shape and shakes, trying to imitate Rictor’s earthquake abilities. 

“That’s so not what I look like.”

“Totally what you look like, man,” Omar asserts.

“Yeah, well,” Julio sighs, “I sort of… lost my powers, there, for a little while. I got them back, eventually, but the computer stuff… it kind of felt like it was connected to that time, you know? When I was… when I was all messed up.” He doesn’t like thinking about it, likes talking about it even less. He’s pretty sure Omar and Mamá and everyone else know about the night he was out on the ledge, but he’s still not interested in bringing it up. “Anyway. I run a club now.”

“Like a book club?”

“No, like a punk-rock dance club,” Julio says. “It’s called the Shakedown.” Omar bursts out laughing. “ _ What _ ?”

“You’re such a nerd,” Omar says, shaking his head fondly. “The name of your nightclub is a pun? Based on your own superpowers? You may have grown up and learned to dress good, Hooly, but you’re still a fuckin’ nerd.” 

Julio throws an orange at him. Omar catches it, the asshole.

* * *

Eventually, Mamá comes back downstairs and asks the boys to go take care of the chickens outside. Omar marches out and Julio follows along reluctantly. At least he’ll have an ally now, and it’s not just him alone against a horde of hungry chickens.

“I'm surprised you came home,” Omar says, opening the gate to the chicken pen. “Since you hate the family and all.” He doesn't say it bitterly or with any aggression. Omar states it like a fact, and that's kind of worse. 

“I don't hate the family,” Julio insists. 

“Could've fooled me.”

“I… I hate what Tío Gonzalo and Papá did to our family. What they turned us into.” He looks at Omar, really looks— the scars on his knuckles, the corner of a prison tattoo disappearing into his shirt collar. “Omar, you remember what you used to wanna be when you grew up?”

“Aw, that was dumb kid stuff.”

“I remember,” Julio continues. “You wanted to be an astronaut. You… you used to want to be an astronaut.”

Omar gets quiet and focuses on the chickens, making sure there’s enough feed everywhere so the hens aren’t squabbling. “Like I said. Dumb kid stuff.”

“It was  _ cool _ ,” Julio argues. And then he says, “You know… I’ve been to space.”

“Man, shut up.”

“No, seriously,” Julio says, thinking about Ship, or the Professor, or whoever. (Thinking, also, about Mojoworld and whether that counts as “space.”) “I’m… sorry, I wasn’t, like, bragging. I just mean that if I’ve been to space, maybe you could go one day, too.” 

“Hmph,” Omar sighs. “Well. Then who would feed the chickens?”

* * *

 

“Julio,” his stepmother says, stepping into the backyard and wiping her hands on her apron. “Can you come in here and wash these dishes? Omar, you dry.” 

“Just like old times,” Omar grumbles. Julio’s mom swats him with a dish towel and then ruffles his hair. 

“ _ Espera _ ,” she says, tugging Julio back by his arm. “Do you have a photo of Shatterstar? Something we can put up tonight?”

Julio blinks, trying to process that. “We… we’re putting up his photo?”

“Of course,” she says. “He was important to you. We’ll put up his photo so we can pray, and remember and honor him in death.” 

Of course. Right. Never mind that just  _ thinking _ about looking at a picture of Shatterstar is going to turn him into an emotional wreck again. He feels like he barely survived ’Star’s funeral, and now his mother is probably going to put the whole family through nine days of praying for a guy none of them even knew.

Or worse. Some of them  _ did _ know Shatterstar. They knew him as the stranger who showed up with Rictor and destroyed the family business. This day just keeps getting better and better. 

“I… yeah,” Julio says finally. Not like he’s going to say no to his mom. “Yeah, I have a photo.”

“Good. Send it to Yolanda. Email her or text her, whatever,” his mother says, walking back inside with him. “She can get it printed before tonight.”

* * *

 

There are fewer people at dinner than at any other “Richter family dinner” Julio’s been at, but there are also more people than he expected. Every time he finds out that someone in his family besides his mom gives a shit about him, it feels like a gift. 

His stepbrother Enrique is there, looking dour as ever but not unhappy to see him. Yolanda, of course, and then Omar is setting the table. T ía Lupe and  T ía Margarita sit on either side of Julio’s mother. 

His cousin Carmen is the last to arrive. 

“Julio Esteban Richter,” she says, like she needs to announce him. “I was beginning to think you would never come back to Guadalajara.” 

“I’m here now,” Julio points out. 

“You got shorter,” Carmen says, even though he obviously didn’t, and also he’s sitting down. “Scooch,” she says, jabbing Omar in the ribs and taking the seat next to Julio. “So, tell me everything. Is Storm just as beautiful in real life? Also, did you really meet Alison Blaire?” 

“Yes to both,” Julio confirms. Carmen shakes her head in awe, her earrings jangling. Julio attributes to Carmen the fact that he was able to survive his first year of being friends with Tabitha Smith without strangling her. Carmen is a lot like Tabby, but maybe a shade classier— which, honestly, isn’t hard to do. 

Yolanda pulls out the photo then, and even though he’s the one who picked it from his camera roll, Julio doesn’t feel ready to see it. In the picture, ’Star is smiling, eyes focused away from the lens of the camera. Julio had been talking to him when he snapped the photo, telling him to put down his swords so they could get a decent Kodak moment. 

Julio feels a pang of grief as his mother puts up the picture of Shatterstar for everyone to see. She explains that Julio lost his best friend, and Julio’s actually grateful his mom isn’t just up and outing him to everyone. That she’s giving him room to tell them himself, if he wants. 

“Tell us about him,”  T ía Lupe says while Julio is loading his plate up with tamales. “Tell us about your friend.” 

“Well,” Julio says, “his name is… was, uh.” What? He can’t exactly say  _ Shatterstar _ without invoking even more questions, questions that he doesn’t feel much like getting into tonight. “Star. He was called Star.” 

“That’s why the face tattoo?” Enrique says, nodding toward the photo. 

Julio swallows. “Yeah, well, it’s. That was actually a birthmark. Mutant thing, you know?” 

“Ahh,” Enrique says, nodding. It’s not that hard for Julio’s family to dismiss weird and inexplicable stuff with “a mutant thing.” The seizures he used to have as a kid were “a mutant thing.” Cable’s metal arm (and the fact that he so resembled the man who killed Luis Richter) was “a mutant thing.” Being a mutant is a lot easier to explain than delving into the Mojoworld and everything that entails. 

Maybe one day he’ll tell someone, maybe Yolanda or Omar or his mom. Maybe one day he’ll talk more about the batshit insane place that Shatterstar came from, and how he escaped it, how he grew beyond it. He hasn’t even told  _ Tabitha _ about all of his own time in Mojoworld— the arena, fighting ’Star, finding baby Shatterstar. 

When it was happening, it was like hell. Looking back, though, at a time when he was scared and trapped and backed against a wall, he can’t help but feel a little nostalgic. At least Shatterstar had been with him. 

 

The food is delicious.

It’s not like he expected anything else, really. 

 

Later, after everyone has said their goodbyes and all the leftovers have been packed away in margarine containers and stained tupperware, Julio wanders outside and finds his gaze drawn to the old pecan tree out back. 

Julio hasn’t climbed this tree since he was a kid, but all the footholds are still there. Omar is already waiting at the top for him. T ío  Gonzalo used to talk about building them a treehouse, but it was one of those things that both boys knew was never really going to happen. 

“That guy. The pelirrojo,” Omar says, his legs swinging beneath the limb where he’s sitting. “He… wasn’t really your best friend, was he?” 

Julio watches the ground. “No,” he says finally. 

“I’m… hey, c’mere,” Omar says, looping an arm around Julio’s shoulders, pulling him close. It reminds Julio of when his father died, and Omar kept trying to give Julio his toys. “I’m so sorry, Hooly. I can’t imagine.”

* * *

 

The day after their family dinner, Julio spends his time chasing chickens, eating everything his mother puts in front of him and watching telenovelas. Julio sits on the couch now, eyes glued to the screen. 

He's not expecting the show to get interrupted suddenly, not expecting the flash of static and then the appearance of a very familiar face. 

He definitely wasn't expecting Shatterstar to show up on his mom's TV and say, in a voice so clear he could be standing right beside him, “ _ Julio _ .”

It’s like his dream from the other night, when he fell asleep watching TV, only this is real. Maybe it was real the whole time. Maybe his dream was no dream. Because right now, in full daylight, when he’s wide awake, he is seeing Shatterstar on the screen, is hearing his own name in his dead boyfriend’s voice. 

Julio’s mother finds him on his knees in front of the entertainment center, nose nearly pressed to the television screen. 

“You'll strain your eyes,” she warns half-heartedly. “Julio, what's wrong?”

“I-it was him,” Julio stammers. “I saw him and I heard him. Shatterstar said my name and… and then he was gone.”

Her expression immediately morphs from confusion to sympathy. “Oh, baby,” she says, kneeling down to stroke a hand through his hair. “After your father passed, I kept seeing him everywhere. Even heard him on the radio.”

Julio shakes his head, feeling his blood pounding in his ears. He'd  _ seen  _ Shatterstar. It felt so real. No way he’s making it up. Could ’Star have survived the blast? Could Shatterstar be alive, trying to reach out to him?  

Julio stares numbly at the TV as it flashes to a commercial break. 


	6. Minor Domo Returns From Hiatus

Lila Cheney drops them in a dusty props room somewhere in Mojo Studios. Swords and plate armor are stacked on shelves around the room, as well as prop guns, jetpacks and fake knives. There are also more mundane props for Mojo’s more domestic film ventures— throw pillows, flower vases, books without any words on the pages. 

“Anybody have the time?” Quark asks. Lila rattles off a stardate that doesn’t mean anything to Shatterstar. When he lived on Mojoworld, he measured time in seasons, sweeps, finales. On Earth he learned months and years. He doesn’t know any other units. 

Apparently, the date means something to Spiral. “Fucking hell,” she grumbles, stomping out of the props room. 

“Wait a tick,” Quark says, thinking. “Ms. Cheney, if you need a certain amount of distance between your location and your destination, would we not  _ now _ be far away enough from Earth to make the jump to—”

“She’s gone,” Shatterstar says dully, staring at the empty space in the room where Lila Cheney stood moments before. Quark’s face falls. “It wasn’t really her, anyway,” Shatterstar points out. “A distilled version of her, maybe. The dregs, collected on The Beach. At least, that’s what Madrox the Bartender told me.” 

“Hm,” Quark says. Outside the room, Spiral continues to swear and kick things. “We should probably go see what she’s so skeeved about.” 

Quark and Shatterstar follow Spiral in her rampage down the corridor. Shatterstar never spent much time in the studio. From what he can tell, the technology and architecture is somewhat more primitive than in his own time. Not Mojo V’s reign, then, but some time before it. With luck, they’ve probably returned back to the same time they started in. 

Up ahead, Spiral is still spouting a string of swear words in mixed English, Mojoese and what Shatterstar thinks might be French. She’s stopped stomping and is standing with her face pressed against a glass panel in the wall. Shatterstar catches up to see what she’s looking at.

Below them sits one of the programming centers, full of dials and switches and screens showing a variety of different Mojo Network programs. The man moving from screen to screen, watching with a bored sort of disinterest, is unfamiliar to Shatterstar.

“I don’t understand. Who is that?” Shatterstar asks, watching the spindly, jaundiced man traipsing around the control room.

“Mojo II,” Quark responds, grimacing. “The Sequel.” 

Shatterstar looks back down at the man. He walks upright like Arize, though it’s not immediately evident whether his spine is biological or bionic. In the stories Shatterstar was told, in the dramatic docuvids, Mojo II: The Sequel was a rejected clone of Mojo I who created a rival network and ultimately replaced Mojo I as the master programmer. 

Legends say he was ousted from power and defeated by Mojo III. But legends also say that Longshot fought only for profits and ratings, and Shatterstar knows too well that that isn’t true. Everything he knows about his homeworld comes through a thick veil of propaganda and distortion. 

“Well, quit gawking,” Spiral snaps, leading them further into the heart of the studio. “The quantum chronoservers are this way.” She marches on, leaving Quark and Shatterstar to bring up the rear of their pitiful party. 

They walk in silence for a moment, each of them lost in thought. “Do you love her?” Shatterstar asks, out of the blue.

Quark gives him a funny look. “Spiral?” Shatterstar nods. “Spiral and I have a… unique relationship,” he says carefully. It doesn’t look like Shatterstar’s going to settle for that. “We can’t seem to stop saving each other’s lives.” 

“Hmm.” 

Shatterstar grew up (if you can call it that) associating Spiral with Mojo V, associating her with the Arena Games and the Spineless Ones’ rule over his race. Once he joined X-Force, he came to know Spiral as a long-time enemy of the X-Men, as a ruthless body modification practitioner in charge of the Body Shoppe. 

But she did save his life. According to Siryn, she even cried while doing it, as if she was genuinely concerned the transfer of his  _ uemer _ to Benjamin Russell’s body wouldn’t take. At the time, Shatterstar took her reasoning at face value— he was destined to kill Mojo V and end the Mojo franchise once and for all. Spiral needed to keep him alive to further her own self-interest. It made the most sense. 

What was her reasoning for saving Quark’s life, then? What, now, is her reasoning for trying to help him return to Earth? 

The more he learns about Spiral, the more questions he has. 

Though he tries to keep up with Spiral and Quark, Shatterstar’s eyes wander relentlessly. He sees movie posters— The Last of the Mojo-hicans, Mo’ Mojo, The Mojo Christmas Carol. He spies a room stuffed with X-Men merchandise, including a tin lunch box with the New Mutants on it and a Wolverine alarm clock. 

In one dark corner of the studio, Shatterstar finds something that surprises him— a girl, seemingly unconscious. She sits slumped against the wall, as though she was dragged there and forgotten. 

“Hello?” Shatterstar asks, curiosity and compassion overcoming any apprehension. He waves his hand in front of the girl’s face; she does nothing. Is she dead? He presses his fingers to her neck to feel for a pulse and finds nothing. 

He, however, doesn’t react in horror. The girl’s neck doesn’t feel quite normal. Not ordinary human skin, but something rubbery and artificial. There’s even a thin layer of dust collecting over her nose and cheeks, as if she’s not a girl after all but a mannequin. Unthinkingly, Shatterstar tries to blow off the dust the way he would a vinyl record and ends up choking and spluttering on it. 

“Shatterstar!” Spiral calls sharply, marching back toward him. “Don’t get distracted.” 

“Who is this?” he asks, a hand on the girl’s shoulder. “Or…  _ what _ is this?”

In the dim light, it almost looks like Spiral’s expression softens. Shatterstar decides he’s imagining it. “Minor Domo,” she explains. “One of Mojo’s more… animated assistants. Mojo II: The Sequel didn’t care to put up with her.” 

“He  _ killed _ her?”

Spiral sighs. “She’s not dead, Shatterstar. She’s a robot. She’s just… off.”

“Oh,” Shatterstar hums. “Then, I’m going to turn her back on.” 

“Shatterstar, wait—” But before he can take a second to listen to Spiral, Shatterstar finds the reset button at the back of Minor Domo’s neck and switches her on. 

For a brief moment, the girl remains still except for a soft thrumming noise from the back of her head. 

And then, suddenly, her eyes snap open and she jumps upward. Shatterstar leaps backward in surprise, staring up at the robot girl. “Hiya, howdy, how ya doin’?” Minor Domo trills, shaking out her wrists and bouncing from leg to leg. “Boy oh boy it’s been so long since I had anyone to talk to and I thought I was never ever going to wake back up again but here I am and here you are and we’re all together and it’s so nice by the way I don’t think I quite know who you are well except for you Spiral—”

“Now you see what you’ve done?” Spiral hisses at Shatterstar. Quark appears behind Spiral’s shoulder, watching the whole exchange with fascination— and some amusement. “Be quiet, girl, or you’ll attract the guards.”

“Oh they won’t care they never patrol these halls at this hour it’s usually completely empty over here actually that’s strange what are the three of you doing here anyway?”

“Never you mind,” Spiral says, lip curling in irritation. “There, Shatterstar, you turned on the tinker toy. Can we go now?” 

“Shatterstar is that your name that’s a beautiful name,” Minor Domo says, eyes flashing as she focuses on Shatterstar. “You’re the one who woke me up aren’t you that’s so great I’ve been dying to wake up it’s been so so long since I got to make a movie I used to love making movies I had my own chair and everything.”

“Minor Domo, is it?” Quark says, stepping between Spiral and Minor Domo before Spiral goes for one of her swords. “Hi, I’m Quark. I know you’re excited, but… we all need to be quiet right now. You understand?” She blinks at him. Quark makes a zipping motion over his lips, and slowly, Minor Domo copies it. “Yes, good. Quiet.” 

“Quiet,” Minor Domo says back in a stage whisper. 

“Okay,” Quark says. He glances at Shatterstar and Spiral. “Let’s keep going.” 

Quark and Spiral take the lead again, leaving Shatterstar to trail behind with the newest member of their party. “So,” Minor Domo says, continuing to whisper, “are you a movie star?”

Shatterstar stiffens up, tries to remind himself that she doesn’t know him, that she probably doesn’t have a firm grasp on what exactly Mojo does. “No,” he says, a little harshly. He adds, in a gentler tone, “I used to fight in the arena.” 

Minor Domo’s eyes look huge in the darkness. She says, “Oh,” and then says nothing else, and Shatterstar considers that maybe he was wrong.

Maybe this girl understands exactly what kind of a creature Mojo is. 

* * *

 

Once they finally reach the room with the servers, Spiral gets to work immediately. Her arms all move manically, flipping switches and turning dials and plugging things in. She starts barking orders to Quark and Shatterstar, leaving Minor Domo to flit between the two of them and avoid Spiral entirely. 

It doesn’t take too long for Minor Domo to calm down and start speaking in complete sentences instead of her earlier stream-of-consciousness babble. “Remember ‘Tuesdays With Mojo’? I directed that,” she says proudly while helping Shatterstar untangle a bundle of cables. 

“Did you like making movies?” Shatterstar says, trying to reconcile the robot girl’s enthusiasm with what he knows all-too-well about life under Mojo’s rule. 

Minor Domo makes a kind of  _ tchk _ sound like a record player reaching the end of an album. “I liked coming up with the ideas. But… the actors. They didn’t want to be there. That part was…  _ tchk _ … not so fun.” 

“Coming up with ideas,” Spiral scoffs from across the room. “That thing's never had an original idea in her existence. All that’s in her head are gears and screws and bolts.” 

“Now, dear,” Quark tuts, shooting her a warning glance before looking back to Minor Domo, sympathy weighing in his dark eyes. 

While Spiral and Quark mess with the servers, Shatterstar investigates the cameras hooked up to one wall. Cables running around the room connect them to other equipment. In one corner of the room, a muted TV plays an old rerun of The Wildways. “Can we broadcast a message over this feed?” Shatterstar says, antsy, shifting from foot to foot in front of the camera. It’s not even on, but it makes his gut twist. Being filmed has never sat well with him, but this is important. “If I can get a message to Julio… if I can let him know that I'm not dead…”

“You won't be able to get much past Mojo's censors,” Quark points out. “Maybe a couple words, all disjointed.”

“That could be enough,” Shatterstar says. “I could make that enough.”

“Too dangerous,” Spiral snarls. “You’d announce our presence to everyone in Mojoworld, including Mojo II: The Sequel.” 

“But this broadcasts to Earth,” Shatterstar says desperately. “I could let Julio know that I am alive.” Right now, it seems like the most important thing in the universe. He still remembers those nine days when he was certain Julio had died in a fiery explosion aboard an airplane. The thought of Julio enduring that same torment and grief… it hurts. 

“Rita,” Quark says very quietly, “just let him.” Spiral’s glare could cut through stone, but she just shrugs. 

“Figure it out,” she says to Shatterstar.

* * *

Quark helps him. They get the camera turned on and linked into the cable feed. Shatterstar steps into view of the lens, digging his fingernails into his hands, trying to remember that he is choosing this. This is how he’s going to send his message to Rictor. He’s not fighting, he’s not performing. He doesn’t have to. He’s okay.

_ You’re okay _ , he tells himself. 

Quark counts down on three fingers and then points to Shatterstar, mouthing, “Action.”

“Julio,” Shatterstar says, staring squarely at the camera, “I’m alive.” What else? “I love you. I’m trying to come home.” 

Shatterstar thinks, suddenly, of the way he threw himself into a fight that time, so many years ago, when Julio left him at the airport. He nearly died, and he didn’t care, and  _ that _ was just a matter of Julio leaving the country. He and Julio have too much in common. When Mephisto “killed” Shatterstar, Julio had immediately thrown himself into the line of fire. 

Shatterstar doesn’t want to think about what Rictor might be doing now, what risks he might be taking just because he thinks Shatterstar isn’t coming back. 

“Take care of yourself,” he says to the camera. Then he glances at Quark, nods. Short and sweet and to the point. That’s all he needs. If that can get through Mojo II’s censors, through the void of space and to Earth… it’s a longshot. 

He may not have inherited his father’s luck, but Shatterstar has learned how to believe in things. He believes in Rictor. After a long time, he believes in himself. He believes in the two of them and the ways in which they will always come back to each other. 

Weirdly enough, he is beginning to believe in Quark and Spiral. 

“The message transmitted,” Quark confirms. “What gets received is anyone’s guess.” 

“Great,” Spiral says, twisting two cables together. “Can we get back to what’s actually important? Remember? Using the interdimensional supercomputers to get the hell out of here?”

“Right, yes,” Quark says, returning to the monitor he’d been working on. Spiral’s on the nuts and bolts while Quark works with the actual programming. Shatterstar has to admit, they make a good team when they aren’t yelling at each other or being sarcastic. 

Minor Domo tries to make herself useful, but despite being an android, she doesn’t know all that much about technology. Shatterstar sits beside her on the floor and watches Spiral and Quark work. 

“Minor Domo…” Quark says after a while, “how long have you been… er, deactivated? It must have been lonely."

“Will you stop that?” Spiral snaps from the other side of the room.

“Stop what?”

“Stop talking to it like it has feelings,” she says. “She's not like you.”

Quark considers that. “Does that mean she's more like you, then?” 

Spiral glares. "Don't go getting philosophical on me. She's just another of Mojo's toys."

"Name one of us who isn't," Quark says.

For a moment it seems like the two of them are just going to keep glaring at each other indefinitely. But then Minor Domo pipes up. "Uh-oh," she says, clicking and whirring as she hides behind Shatterstar. "We're in danger."

Spiral whips around just in time to see Mojo II: The Sequel appear in the doorway, grinning like a shark. 

"Well, well," he leers, surveying the four of them. "I wasn't expecting special guest stars. What a nice surprise."


	7. Julio Richter Watches Television

In the dream, Julio stands outside his mother’s house, laying petal after orange petal in a path on the ground before him. He recognizes the flowers— cempoalxochitl, the Mexican marigolds. On Día de Muertos, these are the petals that guide deceased relatives home to visit. 

This path of petals seems to stretch on forever. Julio keeps adding more petals, meticulous in his work. In that hazy logic that usually guides dreams, he knows what he is doing and why he is doing it. 

He is trying to guide ’Star back home, home from wherever he is now. Home from beyond the dead. 

He wakes up with tears in his eyes again, but at least this time the room isn’t shaking. 

* * *

 

All throughout breakfast, Julio can’t stop thinking about his dream. And not just the dream, but the other little nudges and nods that there’s more going on than what he sees. Maybe it’s intuition. Maybe it’s desperation. 

“Do you think… is it possible that Shatterstar’s not really gone?” Julio asks, looking right at his mother to make sure she knows that he’s serious. 

“Of course,” she says, looking up from stirring sugar into her coffee. She kisses him lightly on the side of the head. “He lives on in your memory, and the stories you tell about him. Death isn’t the end, Julio, it’s—”

“No, Mamá, I mean like  _ alive _ alive. As in… walking around,  breathing.” He flushes, realizing he sounds foolish. “I think… I think he might be out there. Trying to talk to me.” 

His mother purses her lips. “You remember what I told you about hearing your father on the radio, yeah?” 

“It’s more than that,” he sighs. “I mean, yes, I’m… I’m upset.  _ Really _ upset. And  _ sad _ . I miss him so much. But I just… I don’t know. The way things work with… mutants…” He’s not quite sure how to explain to his mom that pretty much everyone he knows has “died” at least once and come back from it no worse for wear. Jean, Cable, Sam, Illyana, Jamie. Why not Shatterstar, too?

“I just… I don’t want to see you hurting, baby,” his mother says, smoothing a hand over his hair. It’s starting to grow long and unruly again. Maybe he’ll grow it out as long as it was when he first met ’Star. And maybe Shatterstar won’t be there to see it, won’t ever come back. The near-constant ache in Rictor’s chest twinges. “I know there are… that strange things  _ happen _ with you and your X-Men, but don’t lose touch with reality, Julio.”

“I haven’t lost touch with reality,” he grumbles, grabbing a piece of toast and slathering it with butter. “I know what’s real, Mamá.” He does, really, he thinks to himself as he munches on toast, crumbs tumbling into his lap. It’s just that he thinks his dead boyfriend might actually not be dead. Is that too outlandish? Is that too much to hope for?

“I know, but you know I worry about you, Julio,” she says, and she takes a sip of her coffee. “This is real, mijo, not a TV show.”

Julio almost chokes on his toast. “TV,” he says, eyes wide. “That’s it.”

“No, wait—” she starts, but he’s already shoved the rest of the toast in his mouth and run off to the living room. 

* * *

 

Back during their X-Force days, Shatterstar had been trapped in a television show with Cable. Julio remembers watching, helplessly, as Shatterstar fought and died on a 32-inch screen. Is Shatterstar not really dead? Is he, instead, trapped in television like the ghosts from  _ Poltergeist _ , doomed to repeat his message for eternity? 

That might explain why Rictor keeps seeing— or  _ thinking _ he’s seeing— Shatterstar appear on television. Like ’Star is trying to get through to him. 

“They’re he-ere,” Julio mumbles, fiddling with the input cables on his mother’s TV. The one she currently has rests on top of her old cathode ray one, like once the old television become outdated it served as a television stand. 

Snow and static, then a blue screen. Julio flips the channel and sees a late morning talk show in full swing. “C’mon, ’Star,” he says, hitting the channel button mechanically. He cycles through every station once, then twice. Nothing. “Talk to me. I know… I know you’re…” What? What is he? Alive and trapped? A ghost? Is it his  _ uemer _ , encased in the digital signals flowing through the cable box right now?

Is Julio just grasping at straws? 

_ “<...call now to take advantage of this offer for…>” _

_ “<... dare you leave me for my brother? I’ll...>” _

_ “<... funded by sponsors like…>” _

_ “<... can discuss sexism in survival situations when I…>” _

_ “<... forever on the Wildways…>” _

_ “<... limited time offer…>” _

“Waitwaitwaitwait,” Julio mutters to himself, flipping back a channel. Sure enough, there’s the familiar hellscape of the Mojoworld Wildways, complete with garishly grinning “actors.” 

“Oh,” Julio’s mother says from the doorway, leaning against the frame. She’s pointing to the TV. “I love that show. So funny.”

“Y-you shouldn’t watch it,” Julio sputters, watching in horror as the characters on the screen start dancing around a rapidly spinning carousel. 

His mother looks confused, and he struggles to think of a good reason that isn’t “you might get sucked into a shitty alternate dimension by a mogul on spiderlegs.” 

“Gwyneth Paltrow shows up in the later episodes.” 

His mother makes a face and shakes her head, looking like she just caught a whiff of rotting food. “Ugh. Alright, I’m not watching it anymore.” 

* * *

 

Julio sits on the edge of the couch and watches MojoTV while his mom flits around the room, fluffing the occasional pillow and picking up the occasional discarded sock. She grabs her purse and goes to have lunch with a friend, and Julio is still watching TV. 

Maybe he  _ was _ imagining things. Maybe Shatterstar really is dead, and he’s just the sad sack who’s hallucinating him.

Almost as soon as he considers that possibility, though, the TV flickers again. And then there he is, in technicolor on the screen. Shatterstar. He says, “ _ I love you _ ,” and then the picture fizzles out and the program resumes.

But Julio knows for sure what he saw. Shatterstar is communicating with him. Shatterstar is alive.

Shatterstar loves him. 

Julio doesn’t realize he’s started to cry until a teardrop lands in his lap. “I love you, too, ’Star,” he whispers to the empty room. 

* * *

 

After that, Julio trades the TV for his mom’s laptop. Just because he’s been repowered doesn’t mean he forgot all of his tech expertise. He’s able to pull up recordings of MojoTV online and filter through for instances of static or interrupted signals. 

The first thing he realizes is that Mojo’s online presence is just as horrifying as he might have expected. Pop-up ads litter the screen. Disturbing viral videos blare from each tab he has open. He’s been on some shady, poorly designed websites before, and Mojo.com takes the cake. 

Disregarding that, Rictor cracks his knuckles and goes into tech whiz mode. He starts clicking through videos, looking for broadcasts that Shatterstar interrupted. Right now, Rictor doesn’t know how or even  _ when _ these messages were recorded. He just knows that Shatterstar is alive, somehow, somewhere out there. 

Rictor watches Mojo Media videos and tries not to think about how much propaganda or even potential brainwashing he might be exposing himself to. That’s one good thing about having strong mental blocks. A heavy hitter like Charles Xavier or Jean Grey might be able to mess with his head, but stuff like subliminal messaging and Mojoworld earworms don’t typically affect him. 

Julio’s been on the computer for two hours before he even finds a clip that includes Shatterstar’s secret message. It’s been spliced into a commercial advertising Mojomunch simulated cheese. In between images of a maniacally happy family pretending to enjoy plasticky-looking pieces of “cheese,” Shatterstar appears on screen to say, “ _ Julio _ —” In the next instant, the commercial resumes. 

Rictor scrubs at his eyes and hurries to download the video. Maybe if he can collect all the transmissions from Shatterstar, he’ll be able to get a better picture of what’s happening and what he can do. 

If he needs to rustle up X-Force and plan a rescue mission to Mojoworld, he’ll do it. He’ll do anything if it means getting ’Star back. 

There are five stages of grief, or so Julio has heard: denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance. Julio hasn’t exactly been checking them off in order— he’s been bouncing between denial and depression for days now.

But this, having concrete evidence that Shatterstar isn’t dead, that he was  _ right _ to be in denial… it’s almost too much to handle. Denial and depression, denial again, discovery, conviction,  _ action _ . 

Rictor isn’t grieving anymore. It’s time to do something. 

* * *

 

Julio's mother’s laptop looks like a digital version of the shed from  _ A Beautiful Mind _ . Screenshots and video clips pulled from various television shows and Mojoworld broadcasts crowd the monitor. So far, he has found seven instances of Shatterstar's transmission cutting through the signal.

“ _ Julio… I’m alive… I love you… I'm trying… to come… home… Take care of… _ ”

Take care of… what? The building? ’Star’s tenants? Jimmy’s got that covered. Take care of the mutants using Julio’s underground passageways? Terry’s doing that. Take care of X-Force? Well, Neena seems to be doing alright at that. 

So what, then? What does Shatterstar want him to take care of?

Julio is still thinking about it when his mom comes back home in the evening. Not wanting her to get more worried about him, he decides not to bring up all the evidence he’s gathered, the proof of Shatterstar trying to get through to him. 

He sits through dinner with her and Yolanda, buzzing with excitement the whole time. Saying the truth out loud seems like it might break the spell, like he’ll open his mouth and suddenly the videos of Shatterstar will go away or turn out to be just another dream. 

Plus, his mom and sister will think he’s off his gourd. 

After dinner, Julio returns to his meticulous task, screening each video coming out of Mojo Studios. It’s a lot of garbage, a lot of really sickening messages. Eventually, he decides he doesn’t need to listen to the audio, muting it and playing 90s punk and ska instead. (The MTV-hell dimension still looks just as much of an MTV-hell dimension, but at least the music is better.) 

And then Shatterstar appears again, clipping in and out of an episode of  _ I Dream of Jean _ . Julio rewinds and pauses his music, turning the sound up on the Mojo video. 

Shatterstar says only, “ _... yourself _ .” 

“ _ Julio… I’m alive… I love you… I'm trying… to come… home… Take care of… yourself. _ ”


End file.
